


The Last of the Port Charlotte 8

by eternalsojourn



Category: Inception (2010)
Genre: Angst, Established Relationship, M/M, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-08-16
Updated: 2011-08-16
Packaged: 2017-10-22 16:30:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 538
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/240105
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eternalsojourn/pseuds/eternalsojourn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It was a long and full life, but that doesn’t make this any easier.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Last of the Port Charlotte 8

**Author's Note:**

> This is an entry for [ae-match](http://ae-match.livejournal.com/102621.html) (link is direct to fic).  
>  **Prompt(s)** : Forever  
>  **Beta** : [metacheese (allnuthatchforest)](metacheese.livejournal.com)

Arthur turns the heavy crystal glass around and around, pale amber liquid glimmering like the late evening summer sun, Eames’s favourite time of day. He lifts the glass to his nose, inhales deeply, cask strength liquor burning his nose. The peat smoke, once so unpleasantly medicinal to Arthur’s palate now reminds him of their trip to Islay, smell of the sea, peat bogs, distillery. Eames had been delighted with their much-planned trip, peppering the distillery owner with questions.

He puts the glass down without drinking; he can’t face that just yet. He flexes his hand, looks at the papery thin skin, the prominent blue veins, the liver spots and wonders when all that happened. He had always called Eames “old man”, and Eames had smiled indulgently, even when Arthur had sat in his hospital bed recovering from hip surgery.

He looks around the room. It’s an odd, comfortable mix: an orderly library full of the rare and antique books Arthur collected, one corner filled with lurid pulp novels he tried to pretend he bought for Eames. The cabinet was filled with an impressive collection of scotches and bourbons Eames always insisted was for both of them, though Arthur rarely touched it — at least not unless Eames selected and poured him one.

The massive heavy desk was the only thing Eames had kept of his father’s estate. Papers are still scattered everywhere across it; Arthur hadn’t the heart to clean it up. He sits in the oversized leather club chair they’d both fallen in love with and had lugged back to England from Salzburg in their SUV. They had both been so excited it occurred to neither of them to simply have it shipped.

He looks again at the glass resting on a coaster on the wide arm of the chair. He runs a finger down the cut crystal. This style was never to his taste but his favourite aunt had left him the set and Eames liked them for his whisky. “Good and heavy,” he’d said, “wide enough at the rim to breathe it in”.

He takes a sip, holding the liquid in his mouth, rolling it around his tongue until the burn subsides. This one was Eames’s favourite. “Sea spray, sunshine, heather, iodine and honey,” Eames had said, though Arthur always suspected Eames was pulling his leg a little. He tries now, vainly, to taste those things. He swallows.

The image of Eames’s face — his weather-lined skin and the faded gray of his eyes twinkling in mischief — rises large in Arthur’s mind. The feel of his broad shoulders, warm under Arthur’s palms, the soft press of his lips. Arthur closes his eyes. The way he’d shave his beard into funny shapes when Arthur was mad, like that pencil-thin Errol Flynn moustache, just to make Arthur laugh. He was impossible to stay mad at.

The silence settles on him like dust and Arthur feels far too small to fill the room the way Eames did. This house is unbearably empty, yet there’s nowhere else Arthur would consider being. His lip trembles, his eyes start to burn, his throat closes off, the ache in his chest opens a pit inside him.

“You said forever, you asshole,” he whispers.

***End***


End file.
